Improper Proposals

by Juliana Ross

  It was already dark when I arrived at Brown’s on Friday, my exhaustion from the long journey melting away as soon as I stepped out of the hansom cab. I wore the darkest and most opaque of my veils, fearful of being recognized, though I was acquainted with few people in London and fewer still who might be found in the lobby of such a grand hotel.

  I approached the front desk alone, having declined any assistance with my single, quite small valise, and cleared my throat to gain the attention of the clerk.

  “Good evening, madam. How may I assist you?”

  “My name is, ah, Mrs. Ross,” I said, the lie slipping easily from my lips. “I believe—”

  “Yes, of course. Mr. Ross said you would be arriving. He is already upstairs. Do you still require a key?”

  “No, thank you. Not if my, ah—not if Mr. Ross is there. Thank you very much.”

  I moved across the lobby and up the stairs, my footsteps slow, my resolve faltering. Was this what I had become? A woman reduced to lies and deceit in order to meet with her lover? A woman who claimed a husband when she had none and, even worse, had no intention of acquiring one, not even if she were found out and decried as the basest of fornicators?

  I was at the door, my heart was racing in my breast, my brow was damp with perspiration, and every ounce of good sense in my body was telling me to walk away. Instead I raised my hand and knocked.

  He opened the door immediately, almost as if he had been hovering behind it, impatient for my arrival. I looked at him, offered the smile he deserved, and my doubts began to wither. Tom wished me no harm. Tom would not hurt me. And as long as we hurt no one, how could this be a sin?

  “Good evening,” I said, setting down my valise and shutting the door fast, taking care to engage the deadbolt.

  “Good evening. Let me take your things. Are you cold? Hungry? I didn’t want to ring down for dinner until you arrived.”

  “I’m fine. Very glad to see you again.”

  “And I you.” He bent his head, likely meaning to offer me a soft kiss of greeting, but I could not bear for him to be gentle with me, not now, not when I was so uncertain. I rose to my tiptoes, flung my arms around his neck, which was no easy task given his superior height and the tightness of my bodice, and opened my mouth under his.

  He pulled me close, filling his hands with my skirts, pulling my gown all out of shape, a growl of almost animalistic desire rising in his throat.

  “Which one?” he asked, breaking our kiss so he might set his forehead against mine.

  “Which what?”

  “Position. Which position do you want to try? I think I can guess, based on your pages, but I want you to tell me. I want to hear you say it.”

  “On my knees,” I whispered in his ear.

  He unfastened my bodice in seconds. He stripped it away, cast it aside, and then he pushed my skirts down, past my hips, until I was free of them and my petticoats and my crinolette.

  He removed my corset cover and my corset. And then, faltering a little, he dragged at the ribbon of my chemise, spreading its gathers wide so he might push the garment low over my shoulders, then lower still until my breasts were bare.

  “Get on your knees.”

  “Here? You don’t wish to move to the bedchamber?”

  “I don’t wish to wait that long. I’m not certain I can,” he muttered, all the while pulling and pinching at my nipples.

  Although I was still half-dressed, I dropped to my hands and knees, feeling very glad I had bolted the door, and equally glad there was a lush Oriental carpet beneath me. The plain oaken floors of my little cottage would have been too hard for such play.

  He knelt behind me, still fully dressed, which struck me as odd, and not a little amusing, since Tom was forever walking about half-clothed, his coat and waistcoat discarded, his shirtsleeves rolled to his elbows.

  “Let me get this bloody French letter in place,” he said, and despite my curiosity I forced myself not to look behind. It was better to wait, my limbs trembling, my eyes squeezed shut, and think of all that would happen next.

  Though he was breathing heavily, his hands were steady as he reached between my legs, between the open crotch of my drawers, and drew his forefinger along the seam of my pussy. I was so wet that my folds parted easily for him.

  A long, hissing breath escaped him. “This excites you?”

  “Yes.”

  “What do you like about it?” This, as he let the weight of his cock press against my bottom. A promise of what was to follow.

  “I...I don’t know. Perhaps because it feels so illicit?”

  “Have you seen animals rut like this?”

  “I live in the country. Of course I have.”

  “None of us wants to admit we’re animals. But that’s all we are. Strip away our clothing, set us on our knees, and we’re animals again.”

  “I suppose,” I said. “Tom, please—”

  “Tell me what you want,” he insisted, still rubbing his cock against me in that annoying way. Would he never be done with teasing me?

  “I want you to rut with me,” I burst out. “Will that do?”

  He laughed. “Yes, it will do.”

  He pulled his cock back, far enough that it might fall into place at my entrance, and pushed forward, his hands gripping my hips to hold me steady.

  What was better? For him to enter me all in a rush, so abruptly that he knocked the breath from my lungs? Or was it better to savor the moment? To know, with each insistent inch, that he would not stop until my body, my thoughts and my dreams were full of him?

  “How do you feel? I’m not hurting you, am I?”

  “No,” I gasped.

  “I wish I’d stripped off your drawers. Then I’d be able to see all of your pretty bum while I fuck you.”

  “Tom—”

  “Sorry. I shouldn’t say such filthy things to you.”

  “I don’t mind. I...I like it.”

  “You do? Do you want to know what I see?”

  Oh, my goodness. “Yes.”

  He thrust in and out of me slowly, carefully, without any particular sense of urgency. “The slit in your drawers is wide, so I can at least see your pussy. It’s pretty. Very pink. Very swollen. So tight around my cock.”

  “Will you not touch me? Between my legs, I mean.”

  “In a minute. First I want to fill my hands with your tits.”

  He arched over me, his breath hot against my nape, and filled his hands with my breasts, squeezing them hard, pressing them together, widening his fingers so my nipples might slip between and be surprised with pinches.

  He suddenly pulled me up and back and set me firmly on his lap, as if he were a chair of sorts. Pinioned by his cock within me, restless for more, I pulled at his right hand, drawing it down over my belly, setting it atop my clitoris.

  “Make me come,” I whispered.

  “Greedy girl. You truly can’t wait any longer?”

  “No.”

  “Very well. But look down. Look at my hand. Tell me what you see.”

  “Your hand...it’s covering my pussy, pressing on it. Ohh...”

  “Go on.”

  “You’re petting me there. So soft. You’re tracing around it, drawing circles. It feels so good.”

  “I’m glad.”

  “It’s so swollen. I can see it. And your finger...it’s rubbing, so hard, so fast...”

  “Shall I make you come?”

  I couldn’t answer, couldn’t speak. So intense—the feelings were so strong, and they were rushing toward me, the world collapsing, and all that was left was his finger on my clitoris, the heat of his cock within me, the sound of his voice in my ear.

  I was coming and coming, the sensations lasting for longer than I thought possible,
and Tom’s voice, when I could once again hear, was very indistinct. “What? I’m sorry, I didn’t—”

  “Forward, Caroline. On your elbows.” His hands urged me down, set me in place, and then he grasped me by my hips and fucked me with the fervor of a man who was about to come. He fucked me so hard that he pushed us across the carpet with every stroke, the soft wool abrading my arms and face, but I didn’t care.

  “Caroline, I...oh, God...”

  He bent low over me, his entire body shaking with the force of his orgasm, and wordlessly sighed out his relief and gratitude.

  I could have stayed there forever, sheltered by his body, safe beneath him, but after a few seconds he kissed my shoulder and withdrew from me. I sat up, my arms shielding my breasts, and watched as he removed the prophylactic from his still-hard cock, wrapped it in a handkerchief and stuffed it in his coat pocket.

  “I do hope I remember to retrieve that before my valet does,” he commented with a wry smile. “Are you alright?”

  “Yes. Feeling very naked.”

  “Do you want to get dressed, or shall I take off some of my clothes?”

  “The latter, please. But perhaps we ought to have our supper first.”

  “There’s no law that says one has to be dressed to eat. Let’s make a picnic of it. We’ll eat in bed, shake out the crumbs, and make love before we go to sleep. Does that suit you?”

  “It does indeed.”

  He was quicksilver, this lover of mine—one moment the smiling, cheerful, gentle Tom that most people knew, the next instant all growling and forceful and utterly certain of himself, of how he could make me feel, and of what he wanted from me as his lover.

  Had anyone else ever seen the hidden Tom, perhaps the true Tom? Had he shown this part of himself to his previous lovers? To his beloved Cecilia? Of course I would never ask, never dream of inquiring about the women who had shared his bed before me. Yet I couldn’t help but wonder: what had drawn him to those other women? And what, in the end, had driven him away?

  Oh, God—what was I doing? I had to stop thinking about such things, for they were none of my concern, and they never would be. When I had agreed to our affair, I hadn’t reckoned on how fond I would become of him, and now, now that I felt so drawn to him, I was in danger of acting very foolishly.

  I would not allow myself to care for him. I would end things before I lost sight of what I wanted, what I needed. I would walk away, content with my memories, and be grateful for what he had given me. I would ask for nothing more.

  I would not allow myself to care for him.

  Chapter Twelve

  It was a week before Christmas and I had come to London for the last time that year, having sent my pages on to Tom several days earlier. As had become our usual routine, he engaged the same suite of rooms we always used at Brown’s Hotel and asked me to wait for him there.

  Upon my arrival at the hotel, late in the afternoon, the clerk at the reception desk had given me a note as well as the key.

  My dear Caroline,

  I’ll come for you this evening at seven o’clock. We’re going out but you don’t need to dress for dinner. Best to meet me in the foyer—if I venture upstairs we’ll never get away on time.

  In keen anticipation of seeing you again,

  T.C.R.

  It was a good thing he didn’t expect me to dress for dinner, since I had only my bombazine gown. There were precious few places I might go so plainly attired, and so evidently a widow in the first degree of mourning. Certainly not the theater, nor any sort of dinner party or social gathering. Most likely he wanted to bring me to his house for the evening. Perhaps he had set up a Christmas tree, or had asked his cook to prepare a special meal for us.

  I sent off my gown to be sponged and pressed. I washed my face and hands and tidied my hair. I checked my reflection in the pier glass again and again, pinching my cheeks to bring out their color, biting my lips so they might swell and redden for him.

  My gown was returned at a quarter to seven. At five minutes to the hour I tied my bonnet ribbons and lowered my veil, set my wrap about my shoulders and drew on my gloves. At seven o’clock exactly I walked into the hotel foyer.

  He was there, as I’d known he would be. Dressed in his workday clothes, which looked rather the worse for wear after a day at the office. We shook hands, a careful greeting offered up for public consumption, and I took his arm and followed him outside to his carriage.

  “Where is Grendel?” I asked as he helped me into the brougham. I had expected the dog to be shoehorned inside for the journey back to Tom’s house.

  “At home.”

  “Then where are we going, if not to your house?”

  “To dinner.”

  “I’m not dressed properly,” I protested. “You said I needn’t—”

  “You don’t. We’re dining with Elijah and Alice, at their home in Hampstead. Neither of them will be dressed to the nines. I promise it will be all right.”

  “But what will they think? How do they even know I’m in London?”

  “I told them. I said only that you were in town for a short visit and that I was seeing you because of some work you were doing for me. That’s all.”

  “Oh, Tom. They will be affronted, I’m sure they will.”

  “Please don’t fret. They’re keen to see you. To see how you are.” Folding back my veil, he tried to make out my expression by the intermittent glare of passing streetlamps. “I meant for this to be a happy surprise, not for you to be worried.”

  “I’m not,” I promised, smothering my doubts. If I didn’t take care to compose myself, and do so quickly, Mr. Keating and Lady Alice would be sure to notice something was amiss.

  “You haven’t been to their house before, have you?”

  “No. I’ve only ever met them the one time, at John’s funeral. He used to come into London, to see you and them and his other friends, but I always stayed at home. I didn’t wish to interfere, and there was always so much for me to do...”

  It seemed silly now, my never having gone into London with John. He would have happily taken me, but I had always held back, anxious that I would seem like some sort of provincial, countrified drab to his sophisticated, wealthy, powerful friends.

  “I think you’ll like their home. It’s one of the older estates, likely a farmhouse in its earlier days, but prettied up at the turn of the century. Still has a large garden, and of course it’s next to the Heath, so there’s plenty of fresh air for the children and dogs.”

  “Children? I thought they only had the one. A little girl.”

  “Alice is expecting. Was enormous the last time I saw her, a few weeks ago. Not long until her confinement, I should think.”

  We occupied the rest of our journey, which lasted close to an hour because of the traffic, with unremarkable conversation. The weather, our plans for Christmastide, our childhood memories of winter. No mention of my latest pages for the guide. Not even a look to signify our hunger for one another. Such appetites would have to remain banked and well hidden until we were safely returned to the hotel.

  The Keatings’ house was set well apart from its neighbors, the Heath beginning where its gardens ended, its windows aglow with lamplight and welcome. Mr. Keating and Lady Alice came straight to the front door to meet us, and I was surprised and not a little touched when she embraced me gently, her rounded shape bumping against me in a rather comical fashion.

  “Dear Mrs. Boothroyd. We’re so very glad you could join us this evening.”

  “Thank you, Lady Alice. I’m honored to be your guest.”

  “And you honor us with your presence. Do come in and sit with me by the fire. Such a cold night.” She took my arm and steered me into their sitting room, where a huge fire blazed in the old-fashioned hearth.

  “Let us si
t a moment and talk, just so I can rest my back for a bit.”

  “Is your confinement expected soon?”

  “Not soon enough. At least three weeks to go, if not more. Clara took her time in making an appearance, so I’m prepared for a wait.”

  “You look very well,” I ventured. I spoke the truth—her complexion was glowing, her face was softly rounded, even her hair was shining. She wore a loose gown that fell, unbelted, straight from her shoulders, its flowing lines emphasizing the beauty of her condition.

  “Oh, Mrs. Boothroyd, I look like a ship under sail. Soon I’ll be reduced to having Elijah carry me everywhere. Do you know I cannot even see my feet?”

  I couldn’t help but giggle. “I suppose that makes it difficult to negotiate all kinds of obstacles.”

  “My mother thinks I shouldn’t even leave the house, now that I’m so far gone. ‘You look perfectly disgusting,’ she told me the other day. ‘Like a brood mare ready to foal.’”

  “I wouldn’t say that at all. You look beautiful. I’m sure Mr. Keating doesn’t care.”

  Lady Alice’s face suddenly lost its merry expression. “How unkind of me—complaining about something so trivial when you have suffered so much. Please forgive me.”

  “There’s nothing to forgive.”

  “We were so fond of your late husband. Elijah was terribly upset when we heard. I’ve never seen him so sad. I meant to write to you before now, to see if you wished to pay us a visit, but he said we needed to give you some time to recover from your loss.”

  “I wouldn’t have made a very entertaining guest. I’m only now beginning to feel like myself again.”

  “We were delighted when Tom told us you were coming to London. Are you here long?”

  “No, not long at all.”

  “Elijah says that you are writing a book for Tom. Are you allowed to tell me anything?” Seeing how I hesitated, she called out to her brother. “Tom, do tell us about your project with Mrs. Boothroyd. She’s too shy to boast of it, I think.”

  He and Mr. Keating had been standing by the front window, talking quietly, but at this he approached and stood by my knee, to all appearances unfazed by his sister’s request.